The Government Addiction

In America, the debate over the warranted degree of government involvement in one’s daily life is ever-present. As citizens, Americans demand protection and security from our leaders. In return, they provide capital, ingenuity, and a responsibility to society. As can especially be seen in the current time of recession and bailouts, citizens rely on the government to regulate and stabilize of our economy - to act on behalf of their wellbeing. However, this has not always been the case. Subsequent to western expansion, the government was hesitant to impose regulations upon its citizens, especially in relation to their economic pursuits. Political leaders relied on powerful businessmen’s’ support for occupational security - so formed the

Currently, education has been a system of miss-education. I believe that children are pushed out of high

Through my research I have found our involvement in the drug world follows the same theme that seems to recur with our government and their policies. We talk a good game that formulates a structure and a well-worded policy that appears to be in the best interest of American citizens and foreigners alike. However we also aid these countries. The problem doesn’t lie within our policies or the simple compassion from our government that drugs hurt our society. The problems occur with those that implement and enforce these policies. Cocaine and its market cannot be eradicated. The efforts of many of our political leaders have been futile because of the supply and demand of the product. In 1989, President Bush had a plan that he called, “The cheapest and safest way to eradicate narcotics” (Menzel pg.43). The result was the following,

The current way the government handles the war on drugs is ineffective and costs America so much(becker and murphy C.1).

“According to a new study released by the World Health Organization, the U.S leads the world and takes the gold for the use of tobacco, pot, and cocaine, far outpacing other countries”(US Ranks #1). According to an article on alternet.org America abuses drugs worse than any other country. It is no secret that the United States’ economy is nearing an all time low. With the economy being nearly as bad as ever in the history of our country it is very concerning that our drug use is at an all time high. If a large percentage of United States citizens do not have jobs, cannot afford food, clothes, shelter, and the government is providing money for these people, where is the

Drug policy in America has not changed much over the past two decades, but according to Sacco (2014) “over the last decade, the United States has shifted its stated drug control policy toward a comprehensive approach; one that focuses on prevention, treatment and enforcement (p.1). One approach to this is allotting billions of dollars to the Federal Drug Control Budget. As of 2014, the majority of funding for this budget went into supply reduction (59.9%), demand reduction (40.1%), and domestic law enforcement (36.8%). Only 35 percent of the funding was provided for treatment of drug abuse, and 5.1 percent for drug abuse prevention (Sacco, 2014, p.16). These numbers have not changed since 2005, when they were within a 5 percent difference

The United States is known to offer the students one of the best educations in the world, unfortunately, there are 2-3 million youths aged, 16-24 years’ old who are without postsecondary education and are "disconnected". “By “disconnected” we mean, young people who are not in school and have been out of work for a substantial period, roughly a year or more” (239). This shows that many young men have no interest in learning but are taking away from those who had an education and can't find a job or got laid off, which isn't fair. Others from the age 16-24, are not enrolled in school and seem to not have a consistent income. People disconnected from the world will lack employment and earnings which will affect their future wages and job opportunity.

It all begin in June, 1971 Nixon officially declares a "war on drugs," identifying drug abuse as "public enemy No. 1." He assembles a task force and the “war on drugs” takes off. At first, it seemed like the government was trying to stop the flow of drugs coming into America. Then in September of 1984, Nancy Reagans “Just say No’ campaign began. From there America began locking up drug offenders at an alarming rate. As a result, today many of those enslaved in the prison system are those who have problems with using illegal narcotics. This has done nothing to stop the flow of drugs on the streets of America, or to rehabilitate those with addiction problems. Instead, according to National Review on “The War on Drugs is Lost” it is seen as, “We are speaking of a plague that consumes an estimated $75 billion per year of public money, exacts an estimated $70 billion a year from consumers, is responsible for nearly 50 per cent of the million Americans who are today in jail, occupies an estimated 50 per cent of the trial time of our judiciary, and takes the time of 400,000 policemen--yet a plague for which no cure is at hand, nor in prospect.” (Buckley). So, obviously locking up those with addiction problems is not the answer to helping them, but then again the ruling majority likes it this way. It keeps prisons full, and keeps the bottom social class in

With availability, still rampant in neighborhoods, drugs are still ruining lives. "Further, prohibition has been ineffective and has failed to demonstrate any significant reduction in drug usage, drug supply, or drug harm" (Buchanan, 2015, p. 1). The only thing that the "War on Drugs" is documented as doing is increasing mass incarceration numbers but did little to combat the issue. Making a substance illegal, can create an appeal to that drug, making it more desirable. The illicit drug market is extremely violent, to begin with, but with enforcement comes more violence. For example, "Disrupting the once steady market by removing a key business leader makes this underground market more volatile, and turf wars become more likely. When a business is forced to operate underground, there are no legitimate means of resolving disputes between producers, suppliers or users" (Buchanan, 2015, p.

Drug Policy in the United States began under the Presidency of Richard M. Nixon, who launched the “War on Drugs” and oversaw the creation of the Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA). The sole purpose of both initiatives was to combat the copious amounts of drugs flowing out of our borders. Then First Lady Nancy Reagan, who will go down in history as the greatest First Lady of All Time, launched “Just Say No”. A campaign aimed towards the youth to refuse the vices of drug and alcohol abuse. These policies were perpetuated in the 1990s under the Clinton Administration who passed their own tough on crime initiatives as well. The upside, the implementation of these policies has caused the drug use rates to equal where they were 25 years ago. On the downside, the United States imprisons more people than any other industrialized nation in the world because of the drug offenses.

Illegal drugs are inevitable and are not going anywhere no matter how hard the United States fights. Reforming the United States War on Drugs would strategically bring money into the states and deplete the bank accounts of the drug lords. The United States abandon the prohibition on drugs and allow the government to control the shipment, production and distribution of drugs recommends The Latin American Caribbean. (Francis, J. N., & Mauser, G. A., 2011) If the United States Federal Government controlled the market place and brought in massive amounts of sources for taxes brining in a vast amount of money. By utilizing this strategy and approach the United States Federal Government would have a start to ending the war on drugs.

The United States is not immune to the worldwide drug addiction epidemic. Drugs pour in from Mexico daily, then distributed to throughout the country. The economic crisis in America is creating an excuse for drug use (e.g., depression, hopelessness). This chemical fix not only creates problems for the addict, but the family and community as well. Every addict has an enabler, a person who makes the addiction possible through various venues of support (e.g., financial, denial). Addicts are only concerned with their next fix and will resort to any means to obtain it (e.g., theft, prostitution, pan-handling). Some have even resorted to extremely desperate measures; for example, murder for inheritance or life insurance proceeds.

Government dependency is replacing the illegal drug trade as the most destructive force in our country. Politicians are the counterparts to the drug kingpins, as are their appointed bureaucrats to the pushers and enforcers. We welcome them into our homes, neighborhoods, schools, businesses, and allow them to infiltrate every corner of society. The pushers and enforcers that feed our addiction to big-government money, exhibit many of the same traits and tactics as drug dealers. The idea of getting more and more people hooked, thus assuring millions of mindless users for life is the same. Not to mention, they offer career employment opportunities for the kingpins and pushers.

Reforms in prevention programs and increase in law enforcement have all come at the cost of tax payers. The Drug Policy Alliance estimates that since the War on Drugs started three decades ago Americans have paid about one trillion dollars toward the campaign (Sledge 1). The only change the country has seen is a five-hundred percent increase in the incarcerated population (Carroll 1). In reality, it has seemed that the US government has profited off of the money of taxpayers by dealing with private prisons. Today nearly

Drug prohibition may be a factor that is actually encouraging the spread of harder drugs. As government officials and police officers become more skilled in capturing drug smugglers and dealers, the pushers find more efficient ways to transport and conceal drugs, creating a larger supply and often making hard drugs more accessible and affordable to the common user. Although the government has succeeded in raising marijuana prices from $20 and ounce in the 1960’s to $200 an ounce today, the price of cocaine has fallen from $50,000 a kilo in the 1970’s to $10,000 a kilo today. Also, the potency and composition of these drugs is often unpredictable. If the government legalized these more minor drugs, as Milton Friedman pointed out in his essay “There’s No Justice in the War on Drugs,” they’d have the ability to regulate them and make them less dangerous than they would have been if they’d been sold on the street.